Chapter 8

I literally had no idea what to think.

Where, besides right now and in art class, have I seen these eyes before?

Why am I seeing black and white?

And why we're all the guys staring at me like they were deciding wether they should kill me or not?

"Alright," I started with a sigh, shaking slightly from what happened a couple minutes ago. "What the hell is going on with me?"

"Well, speaking of Hell," Rahab said, earning a slap in the head by Ioael.

"What he means to say is, congratulations! You aren't going to be a demon!" Ioael corrected awkwardly, a nervous smile on his face.

"What am I, then? Because I'm obviously not human anymore either," I added in a bland, monotoned voice. I crossed my arms as all of the men in front of me tried to put their thoughts into words.

"You... The eyes you have... Only one other person has them," Cassiel said slowly, as if trying to measure what he should and shouldn't tell me.

"And... Who might that be?" I said just as slowly, mentally preparing myself. Did I really want to know?

"I think you've already met him," Ariel said, glaring at a wall with his hands clenching to the point where you could see veins sticking out- his whole body stiffened up.

"His name is Samael," Belial said, rolling his eyes when he noticed no one would answer the question. "He's the angel of death. He has a couple nicknames on Earth... Death, the grim reaper, the guy in the black cloak, etc."

I nodded slowly, trying not to freak out.

"So... Am I like him now?" I asked them, gulping when they didn't answer for three minutes.

"No," Rahab said, looking into my eyes. "You're different. You still have a little bit of human in you, surprisingly. That can be a good and a bad thing..."

"How?" I asked, gripping my left bisep with my right hand- that had broken out of the chains.

"Well," Ioael drawled, making my eyes twitch. I don't know why, but he was really getting on my nerves. "Good, because that means that there's a slim- and I mean, so small it's barely there- chance that you can reverse the curse and go back to being a human. That also means that you aren't a complete monster like Samael is.

"The bad news..." he trailed off slowly "is that you still have to do a couple things you might not want to do, and you are basically kind of his slave."

Well... This is just great, now isn't it?

"What do you mean by me having to do things I don't want to do?" I asked, sitting up straighter on the bed in a cautious way.

"He means," Ariel mumbled "that you're going to have to kill people to be able to-"

"WHAT?" I yelled in shock, my eyes bugging out of my head.

"You. Have. To. K-"

"I heard what he said!" I snapped at Rahab's little smart-ass reply, gritting my teeth.

"Whoa. Calm down," Rahab chuckled out, making me glare at him and mentally picture me killing him.

I hate everyone.

"Michelle, I know this is a lot to take in," Ariel said with a sigh, looking at me sadly, "but we don't have time to answer all of your questions. We have to prepare you, now."

"Prepare me?" I asked, furrowing my eyebrows.

"I will be helping you learn how to block out the demons and learn how to master some mental skills you'll need to use," Cassiel answered, taking a step forward.

"I will teach you how to fight and use weapons," Rahab added with a smirk, taking a step forward.

"I will help you with stopping transformations, or at least holding back the transformation," Ariel stated, taking a step forward.

"I will teach you how to be seductive and alluring," Belial said with a lopsided smirk, puttin his hands in his pockets as he took a step forward.

"And I," Ioael said "will be teaching you about the history of what you have become and will teach you more about what you are and who we are."

"Okay..." I said slowly, letting everything I've just been told and been through process through my head. "Okay..."

"So... Pizza, anyone?" Belial said, making everyone except for me glare at him.

"This is serious," Cassiel said harshly making Belial's jaw drop.

"I'm being serious too! I'm fucking starving over here!" Belial exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air dramatically.

"We don't even need f-" Rahab started, but cut it short when he was elbowed by Cassiel in the stomach harshly- Rahab's groan of pain quiet, but noticeable.

"That isn't necessary. I've known you people were different ever since Rahab here decided to try and scare me in class," I grumbled, leaning my head on my hand. "And can I please get un-cuffed?"

"Yeah, sure," Belial said as he put his hand in his back pocket and grabbed a pair of keys, walking towards me at the same time.

"I don't see why you don't just break free of it like you did with the other one," Rahab said curiously, making me look at him with a blank face as Belial started to unlock the cuff, or whatever it was.

"I don't like damaging people's property, sorry if that comes off as stupid," I said sarcastically as I rolled my eyes and rubbed my wrist gently when it was finally out of the chains it was put in.

"Well, you already broke one, so what are we going to with just one anyway?" Rahab countered, making me hold in a frustrated growl.

"Dude. Quit it," Belial said to Rahab, noticing I was really close to snapping.

"What?" Rahab asked innocently, making my eyes twitch.

Why was I getting so irritated so easily?

"Okay, let's start teaching, shall we?" Ioael asked making my head snap to where he was at the speed of a blink of an eye.

"What?" I asked in shock. "Already?"

"Yes," Ioael groaned out. "We don't have much time. We need to start as soon as possible."

"Give her a break," Ariel said with a sigh. "She's getting all this stuff shoved at her. I don't think it's smart to throw all of this at her and then have her start training right after."

"Ariel, we don't have time for procrastinating," Ioael scolded, making Ariel's eyes narrow slightly.

"I'm not procrastinating, I'm taking her health into account!" Ariel growled, making my eyes widen slightly.

"Ariel's right, you can't throw all this shit at her and then expect her to go to training after words," Belial stated in agreement, making Ariel smile smugly.

"We don't have time to fuck around guys, she needs to learn how to defend herself and control herself," Rahab countered, taking Ioael's side.

"Let's not argue about this right now. Michelle, are you okay with training today or not?" Cassiel said in a calm voice, looking at me expectantly.

"Well, I mean..." I said quietly, not knowing what to say.

Michelle, it's not worth it. You need to relax. Just say no, Ariel said in my head- my head throbbing after words.

"I think I should rest and let all of this sink in first," I answered as I looked around at the guys- my black and white eyesight not vanished yet.

"Okay, well, what are we going to do with her eyes?" Ioael sighed disappointedly, looking at me like I was a burden.

"... Colored contacts?" Ariel suggested as more of a question, making them look at me with questioning looks.

"... What?" I asked bluntly, looking around at the guys in confusion- making them look at me with a look that said "are you serious?".

"Are you okay with contacts?" Cassiel asked me, making me shake my head at my stupidity.

"Oh, sorry," I muttered as I tried to get myself to focus more. "Yeah, I'm alright with that."

"Okay," Rahab said, walking out of the room- my eyebrow raising at his exit.

"He's going to get the contacts," Belial answered my unspoken question, making me give him a half-smile as a thank you.

"So... I'm not going to sugarcoat it," Ioael stated after a minute of silence, making me force myself not to roll my eyes. Since when does he sugarcoat anything? "You're going to be in a lot of pain and weird things will be happening to you for a good amount of time. You stopped one transformation, but you can't stop this new one. And this one will be a lot more harsh and lengthened. We will have at least one of us be in each of your classes, so just in case something happens or you end up doing something stupid we can be there to fix it."

"My heroes," I said sarcastically, not liking the fact that I would need help with all of this. I'm used to doing things and solving problems by myself. I don't like getting help or being stuck with partners. So the fact that they keep saying that I'll need their help and stuff like that is really getting on my nerves. To me, needing someone's help is the equivalent of being too weak or stupid to figure it out by yourself.

"The sarcasm is very disrespectful, so I recommend you stop it," Ioael scolded, making me stare at him with a cross between a blank and a bored look.

"Ioael, stop acting like you're the man in charge, because you're not," Belial deadpanned, making Ioael cluck his tongue on the roof of his mouth and walk away from us to sit on the desk chair.

"Are you feeling okay?" Ariel asked me with concern, making me give him a half-hearted smile and nod.

"I'm fine, thanks for asking," I replied with a sigh, looking at his eyes. As I stared at them I saw them brighten and sparkle slightly, and then go back to a normal green repeatedly a couple times- making me stare at them in amazement.

What are they?

"So," Cassiel said sharply, ripping apart Ariel and I's little staring contest. "What are we going to do now? She can't go back home to her family, now. She needs to stay away from humans as much as she can now."

"Um... I have a real quick question," I mumbled, scratching the back of my head. "Do I have to kill people?"

"Yes," Cassiel said in a sad way, sympathy in his voice. "I'm afraid so."

"But, what if I don't? What will happen to me?" I asked curiously, making the guys stare at each other for a minute- most likely telepathically asking each other wether they should tell me or not.

"Well," Belial trailed off, scratching his neck. "I highly recommend you kill people."

"Because," Ariel sighed out, looking down at the floor. "If you don't... you'll die."

My eyes bugged out of my head as I stared at them in shock, my jaw almost dislocated from how open my mouth was.

"W-What?" I asked, making Cassiel step in with his comment.

"Not automatically, though," he said quickly, making me let out a small breath.

That makes me feel a little better.

"If you haven't fed in ten hours you'll start to get headaches," Ioael said in monotone, twirling a pencil around with his index and middle finger as he stared at the ground. "At twelve hours, your demonic side will start to try to come out and when it does it will feed on whatever human it sees. If you manage to get to thirteen and fourteen hours you'll start to get really weak. You'll start to throw up and your body will feel like it's being weighed down. By fifteen hours... You're dead."

"But look on the bright side," Belial said quickly, making me snap my gaze to him. "Besides that and getting stabbed in the brain/heart, you'll literally immortal. You're healing is ten times as fast as a human's healing time, and you're ten times as powerful as well, hence the cuffs that you easily broke off."

"That's... Nice to know..." I said slowly, wondering how many other things I could and couldn't do.

Honestly, all of this is as terrifying as Hell. I am what my parents have told me to fear and hopefully never be a part of. I'm the opposite of Heaven itself. How I'm dealing with this so well is a mystery to me.

"I'm back," Rahab said casually, throwing something at me as he walked in. I caught it without thinking and put it in front of my face, inspecting what it was.

"A... Contacts box?" I asked, looking up from the weird object to see if they would nod in agreement.

"Yes," Rahab answered "but these are... Different types of contacts. They'll hide your new eyes with the brown color, and they'll change your black and white vision to the normal, colored vision you had before as well."

"Oh," I said with raised eyebrows, looking back down at the box in astonishment. "That's... cool."

"So... Are you gonna put them on or is everything I did going to be for nothing?" Rahab asked with a quirked eyebrow after five minutes of total silence- not even crickets daring to make noise outside-, looking at me in a challenging way.

I sighed and looked down at the box. There was some kind of weird, foreign handwriting- that I couldn't pronounce- on it in some form of cursive. I tilted my head to the side, my brain working on overdrive.

Where have I seen that type of handwriting before?

"Yeah, um... Yeah, I'll put them on," I said in an off-sounding voice, my throat feeling like it was cracking apart.

"Hurry up, Michelle," Belial said, looking at me with slight impatience "the pizza man's here."

"But, there was no rin-" I started in confusion, but was cut off by the ringing of a door bell.

"Hello?" the sound of a guy that sounded my age yelled, his voice surprisingly sounding like it was echoing through the halls.

Don't they have furniture in here?

"Pizza delivery!" he yelled a lot louder than last time, making me wince and hiss in pain.

'He's caused you pain?' a familiar- yet... unfamiliar- voice asked in a dangerous way, sounding a lot angrier than I thought he sound.

I nodded my head, apparently too stupid to realize he needs me to talk to underst-

'You better make him leave before I kill him,' the same man's voice growled, making my eyes pop out of my head as I took the contacts out and hastily put them on before scrambling to the front door- not noticing that I was coming from the third floor and that the house had too much furniture for things to be able to echo.

"Hey! Yeah, I'll take the box-" I said quickly, but then my eyes locked onto his- our stare not breaking.

Now, this wasn't because he was my crush or because I was in love with him. Nor was it because I thought he was attractive. He didn't look familiar or anything either.

No, this was a different story.

'Food,' I sighed dreamily inside of my head as I licked my lips and stared at him, the demons that were once whimpering and silent now cheering me on.

'Yes!' a high pitched scream said, making me grin at the guy in almost a mischievous way as they yelled excitedly.

"Yes, M-ich-elle! Food!" a smaller demon sounded,mal most sounding like a kid because it didn't know how to pronounce my name.

'Try a little! Take a bite!' demons said, basically repeatedly saying that, sometimes changing around the words a bit.

And by the time they got really excited about it, my mind was already made up.

What could one little death hurt?

"Well doesn't someone look delicious?" I asked slyly as stared at him with a smirk. The blush that pourer onto his cheeks and neck told me he didn't interpret it the way I meant it.

Maybe I should give him a better hint before I rip his head off of his neck? Be a little bit like the wolf in "Little Red Riding Hood".

"Well, you're so cute," I cooed, making his blush turn darker.

'He even has a tan. That makes him look ten times more appetizing!' a demon whispered to me making the others giggle and me grin again.

"So cute, that I could just eat you U-" I said slowly as I started to walk towards him like a predator carefully stalking its prey, but was cut off when someone stiffly grabbed my bicep from behind and dragged me quickly into the house.

"Chloe, you silly girl! Michael said he would take care of this!" Rahab said in a very fake happy voice, his grip getting more stronger and hurtful as we walked.

"Well, Jerry, I decided that I would go see what kind of pizza you bought," I stated innocently as I turned towards him, seeing a vein stick out of his neck as he glared straight in front of himself. "And I'll be the first to tell you that it looks delicious," I added as turned to the pizza delivery guy to give him a wink.

At that point he looked like he was in some sort of trance, making the demons scowl in distaste.

'Never ins, this asshole isn't innocent,' a demon muttered, and just like that the hunger was gone.

And just like that I turned to look at where Rahab was looking and froze like a deer caught in headlights.

"I got the money!" Belial yelled quickly as he zoomed down the stairs and sprinted towards the door and shut it so Rahab and I couldn't be seen by the pizza man.

"Oh my God," I whispered to myself, my head buzzing and racing with thoughts going 100 mph. "I almost... I could've... I could've just... Kill... But, I would never... Kill..."

"Lily, I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to do this for your own good," he sighed out, making me turn to look at just to see a genuinely apologetic face.

"Do wh-" I was about to ask, but was once again cut off by Rahab hammering me in the temple full force with his fist that had a pointed ring on it.

I saw blackness before I could even process that I was hurt.